1/32 CF104 Italeri

[MikeA]

Thanks Mark! I ended up stripping the foil off as I wasn't going to be happy with it. After only two hours it was surprisingly difficult to remove - certainly no gentle handling required at all. That bodes well, as I was a bit concerned about masking over the foil, but will definitely not be a problem.

 

I'll have a play with the airbrush settings to see how to beat the beading up problem, so it may be a while before I have anything further to show.

 

Cheers,

 

Mike

[ollieholmes]

Really nice work. Id love to build a Canadian F-104 one day.

[ClumsyDude]

Spraying glue through your airbrush ... oofff, you're a better man than I am. Good luck with the foiling, that feels way too grown up for me. Maybe one day!

 

Jim

[MikeA]

Thanks Ollie. Just do it! The Italeri kit is a good base to work from so long as you approach it with that in mind.

 

I know what you mean Jim. Surprisingly it causes no issues with the airbrush at all and is dead easy to clean up. What does vex me is the resulting aluminium orange look which I can't seem to avoid. Think I might be heading to a soft brush and diluting the glue with alcohol.

 

Cheers

 

Mike

[karimb]

Mike buddy. Fantastic work. I use micro foil adhesive too on the foiled canadian dart i built in 2015. I started off thinning it with water then found out it actually worked better with alcohol at a later stage. I used to lay down the foil on glass make sure it was clear of wrinkles and then airbrushed one thin coat let that dry and then a heavier coat and let that dry.

It was my first foiling adventure and i thoroughly enjoyed it.

That's the link of the rfi thread. There's the wip link in it maybe it will help out with the foiling.

Looking forward to more!

 

http://forum.largescaleplanes.com/index.php?showtopic=58175&view=&hl=&fromsearch=1

 

Karim!

[MikeA]

Hi Karim! I certainly have been looking over your WIP - very inspirational! Certainly a beautiful job. Thank you for the tip about using alcohol to thin it through the airbrush. I'll give that a whirl over the weekend. I just might be prudent and use some of the leftover parts in the kit to practice on.

 

I splashed out $1:50 on a large white ceramic tile to prepare the foil on, and also use a bit of water to hold the foil down. My little modelling corner is as spotless as a prepped surgery now. I'd certainly rather airbrush the glue on, so long as I can get that smooth finish. Using a brush or scraper will be a last resort as I suspect will require a lot more work again.

 

Cheers

 

Mike

[spyrosjzmichos]

The more this plane is taking shape the more beautiful it looks Mike!

I really wanna see this one finished!

It just looks impressive!

[MikeA]

The more this plane is taking shape the more beautiful it looks Mike!

I really wanna see this one finished!

It just looks impressive!

 

Thank you Spyros! I'm wanting it finished as well, but probably for slightly different reasons. I've done some more experimenting with the glue this morning, but my work is at an end for the next couple of weekends at least. It's our 34th wedding anniversary, and modelling is not an appropriate activity at such times! Next weekend we are off to NZ to see our grand daughter again.

 

Anyway, the alcohol thinning works wonders. I tried it on one of the kit main wheelbay doors that I am not using. In the process I learnt how to deal with creases coming from the small rounded projection. I hadn't bothered preparing the piece at all, so it isn't perfect by any means, but I am still really impressed with the finish it gives. Certainly is a world ahead in terms of being resilient compared to the Alclad finish.

 

A 50/50 mix of glue and alcohol sprayed through the airbrush at about 18psi in two coats. I was so impressed that I rushed and did the rudder again. I am pleased with it and there was only one blip really. When trimming the top edge I had failed to run the blade completely along the foil - you fold the foil onto the top edge, run the blade along, flip the piece over and do the same for the opposite edge. This then allows you to remove the foil and gives an edge which is foiled. In my case, removing the waste foil resulted in a small tear which you can see at the hinge end of the top edge. This should hide with a paint touch up.

 

 

A few lessons:

1. Never rush when foiling! I read on one website that you should take the time to properly address the foil. Saying some sort of mantra possibly helps as well to keep the mind and hands calm.
2. Don't leave alcohol thinned glue sitting in the airbrush for any length of time. It does clean out with lacquer thinner, but does unnecessarily add to the workload.
3. Its best to spray a larger piece of foil and cut what you need from it, putting the rest aside for the next area to do. This way you can run some thinner through the airbrush to keep it from gumming up and be all nice and clean for the next time. Common sense, I know, but I had to learn it again.
4. It's a messy process and requires bulk cotton buds and a fair bit of alcohol - fortunately not my single malt supply!
5. I think that painting areas such as the grey panels and fibreglass panels before foiling is probably the best approach. These can then be roughly masked off when foiling the panels around them to lessen the glue clean up required. Certainly worked well on the rudder.

Thanks again to Karim for the alcohol tip. Once I get back from NZ it should be full on into smooth foiling.

 

Thanks for looking,

 

Mike

[MikeA]

I finally made a start on the foiling after a few weeks of family commitments. It's still tricky getting time to sit at the modelling mat as the weather has just been too good to waste sitting inside!

 

The first photo shows my start on the intake areas. I have varied a bit from what would be expected by trimming the foil across the middle of a panel both at the top and the bottom of the intakes. The reason for this is that the intake covers as moulded have a couple of panel lines which don't actually exist - there should be a panel which covers both the fuselage and the intake cover where the two join. It will be interesting to see how my plan to achieve this works out in the end. Essentially I'm hoping to butt join two pieces of foil grained in the same direction and feather the join with one of my wife's nail polishing sticks. Fraught with danger in more ways then one!

 

 

One problem I have encountered from the start is how to prevent glue from getting over adjoining foil when using this method of applying the glue to the foil rather than to the model. If nothing else it does make for a very messy tedious process. I am also finding that the glue is setting very solidly once pressure is applied - so much so that removing the waste to the side of the panels can be difficult. I was expecting the foil, when first applied, to be a lot easier to remove than it is.

 

That aside, I then attached the intake covers. For some reason the starboard cover went on perfectly, albeit with some physical persuasion, and the port one was a nightmare. I ended up having to superglue, fill and viciously sand the fuselage/intake cover join on the port side and will now have to reinstate the once very nice rivet line and panel lines. The work also lead to me ripping a piece of the finished foil which I subsequently patched - there is a barely noticeable triangular patch below the intake where you can see an irregularity in the panel line just behind the air outlet. 

 

 

In the next photo you can see the panel line which needs filling along the top of the intake cover - it is the full length horizontal join line between the cover and the fuselage which is not there on the actual airframe. The foiled panels continue onto this area, both on the cover itself and between the cover and the fuselage. The same arrangement is found on the underneath of the intakes. There is also a small nick where my fingernail caught the foil on this side whilst pressing the cover into place - I have patched it but will have to do some further work on it yet. Fortunately the intakes are the last of the tricky bits (by which I mean any part which must be flush mounted to the fuselage) to fit, so hopefully the risk of further damage through operator error is low. 

 

 

These photos also show how the Alclad on the fuel tank cover did not survive the handling. This was expected and I will be finishing these areas with foil as well. Next, though, it is reinstating the surface detail on the port intake cover and painting the remaining fibreglass panels.

 

Thanks for looking. Suggestions re containing the glue to the area to be foiled would be much appreciated!

 

Cheers

[LSP_Kevin]

Great progress, Mike. Foiling can be tricky, that's for sure. Brian is our resident foiling guru, and he and I will be collaborating on something interesting in the area later in the year.

 

Kev

[MikeA]

Hi all,

 

Well after getting on to 18 months, I have finally gotten back to this. Life was seriously interrupted by major changes in jobs for both my wife and me, a change in cities in which to live and a family wedding back home. Things are slowly getting back into focus again now though, although I dare not speak too soon!

 

So, huge apologies for not being around on the site or keeping up with this build. I have made progress with the foiling. The main breakthrough was vaseline! Smearing that on adjoining panels sorted the issue of sticky glue residue all around where I was placing the foil and also prevented inadvertent glueing to the wrong panel. I also found a working method and layout of gear which suited my approach, so meant that the whole potentially very messy process was well and truly under control. I continued with a 50/50 mix of foil adhesive and alcohol sprayed through the airbrush and have managed to keep the glue in the airbrush without gumming up the works for over six hours at a time. Careful, but very easy, airbrush clean up with alcohol has meant no problems at all.

 

The process for each panel has essentially been:

• Cut piece of foil slightly oversize and lay on wetted ceramic tile
• Spray first coat on piece of foil
• Smear vaseline around the panel edges adjacent to the one to be foiled
• Carefully clean any vaseline from the panel to be foiled with alcohol on a cotton bud
• Rotate piece of foil 90 degrees and spray second coat, and leave to dry (about 3 - 4 minutes)
• Roughly place foil using cotton bud
• Work foil with a paper artist's stick
• Work detail with a rounded toothpick
• Run point of fresh #11 blade along the panel lines, and carefully remove excess foil
• Clean off vaseline and any glue with alcohol on a cotton bud and/or tissue
• Use pointed toothpick to finish fine detail
• Final pressing using paper artist's stick
• Clean ceramic tile with alcohol, breathe and move onto the next piece

 

The foiling process is, I'd have to say, rather violent on the model. It requires substantial but very carefully directed pressure on the panels. I quickly found that any "sticking out bits" were at high risk of damage as I'm concentrating on a panel at the other end of the model. The two spike bits on the seat rails were constant victims, as was one of the gear door hooks in the main undercarriage bay. I gradually learned to always check where they were in respect to the desk top! Fortunately I always managed to find the pieces as they snapped off. Added to that have been some panels which have required reworking up to six times. A small panel underneath the front of the nose and the rearmost panel on either side of the tail were the worst ones. The latter was because of the careful pressing work which was required on the edge, which invariable resulted in whatever tool I was using slipping over the edge and ripping to foil. It took a while! The other hassle has been the corners of existing panels lifting as they caught on something on my cutting mat as I was working another panel. This could probably be resolved with using a cloth to rest the model on as I was always having to change the position of the model whilst working on a panel.

 

The foil used so far has almost all been cheap supermarket kitchen foil. I pre-grained it using fine Microscale mesh. I used self adhesive Bare Metal Foil on the leading edge of the tail and the thin panels which run across the wings where they butt up to the fuselage. I've now got to the stage of attempting to create different colours in the foil.  

 

I have not polished any of the foil at this stage, and I'm not sure that I will as the airframe is supposed to be one in use but very well maintained. On with the pics .......

 

These first ones show where I fitted the foil which goes across the joins between the intakes and the fuselage.

 

 

 

 

In the next ones, the wings are just press fitted to provide me with some encouragement. I did find that the front of the glueing tab for each wing required a slither cut off to enable the wing to sit exactly where they should as well as being hard against the fuselage.

 

 

I painted the grey panels before foiling, which worked out fine for me, although the nose tip will require respraying.

 

 

 

Thanks for looking - and, again, sincere apologies for the extreme delay in posting.

 

Cheers,

 

Mike

 

 

 

Edited August 19, 2018 by MikeA
Redundant Flickr titles removed

[alaninaustria]

Hi Mike, that is some really spectacular work!! Looks great - so realistic!! Thanks for sharing your technique!

Cheers

Alan

[LSP_Ray]

Nice! Think I will stick with Alclad...looks nice, but sounds like a headache!

[Out2gtcha]

Looks excellent!

 

You can also use some shaped balsa sticks to burnish the foil down as well. The Vasiline not only prevents overlap panels from sticking to the previous one, it goes a LONG way to help shape and smooth the foil over areas like wing roots.

Wrenalds Wrap exta strength and the like "stretches" around complex/convex curves much better than the cheap stuff surprisingly.

 

For me, I found it's easier to spray a 50/50 mix of MS glue and water or alcohol on a larger sheet of foil and cut it up as I go (not TOO large or it gets contaminated) for each individual panel.

[DonH]

Yep, that looks great. I am certain I will never, ever, try this. That just leaves me having to watch your build instead